short stories

Twelve miles north of Asheville, nestled amid the rugged terrain atop a sharp cliff, the Cole family had their farm, a few sloping acres cleared against the soughing of oaks and pines. Encircled by looming crags that reached up to touch the Carolina sky, the homestead buildings clung to the earth, huddled together and crouched low, fearful of a stray gust that might blow them into the ravine. The little cabin and the old, rotting barn, worn and weathered by such winds over the years, their wood bleached gray and tinged with hues reminiscent of the granite mountains, silhouetted against the surrounding peaks in the early afternoon light. A pair of sturdy workhorses, a lone black-and-white dairy cow with her calf, a motley crew of chickens, and an old, mangy sheepdog stocked the place. Sparse crops struggled to survive in the rocky soil, the corn stunted but hardy, its ears growing on the sheltered side of the stalks against the unrelenting mountain breeze.

 

Ma was a weathered woman with eyes every hue of the forest. The people of Buncombe County said her husband must’ve drowned in a flash flood prospecting for gold down in the dried-up ravine below their cabin. Others thought maybe he’d just taken off his hat that day, wiped his brow, smiled into the disappearing sun, and disappeared himself. The search never found anything but his hat and handkerchief, and Ma never spoke of him after. She had overseen the homestead for the near decade since his disappearance.

 

Ma had three children. Two diminutive ones aged eleven and thirteen who ran circles around the barn chasing the tail of a fox as it dashed behind a corner. Ma named them Silas and Ana and kept them fishing in the nearby creeks or hunting for wild berries when the truant officer was off in some far away part of the county. And there was Ezra, the tall smiling boy of nineteen, gentle and affectionate, but content to do nothing. He was all arms and legs with limbs that seemed to have outgrown their purpose. His beady eyes looked out from underneath a frock of black hair that Ma cut straight across his forehead with a pair of shearing scissors from when the family had sheep and were more fortunate. Ma thought he was fine and brave, but she never told him so. 

 

One morning, many years past, when the fog was heavy and the birds were yet to wake, Ezra had silently followed his father as he stalked through the woods. The silver of the rifle, worn shiny the whole length of the barrel, floated like a specter across the silhouette of the oaks and brush. It was over a gentle sloping hill where Ezra first saw it. Through the drawn curtains of mist, a pair of horns danced in a delicate ballet, giving cautious way to a most beautiful creature. The horns paused their movement. Ezra and the forest drew in their breath, trying to will away the already known inevitable. An unmistakable crack rang from the other side of the ridge, and the horns dropped below the undulating platform of fog. 

 

Ezra had wept and ran to his father, swinging his fists wildly at the old man who hushed him, placing his felt hat upon the boy’s head and wiping his tears. “It is a man’s thing,” his father said, “one day you will understand. One day you will do the same as that is the way of man. It is how it always has been, for the curse of man is greed and want. It is a thankless thing to be, and it is cruel. And it is what must be done if I am ever gone away.”

 

Ezra sat now and smiled shyly thinking of that morning, jamming the blade of his knife into the ground to keep it sharp. It was his inheritance. Its handle was made from that buck’s antler that his father had taken with his rolling block rifle that liked to jam in the action. Ezra’s father had taken great care of the blade. Ezra kept it with him always because of what his father had said.

 

Comfortable now in his usual spot in the barn, Ezra leaned back with his head resting on the hay, one hand stroking his dog’s ear, noticing the rough notch where another dog struck and bit part off, the other flicking his blade open and closed. He flicked it open once more. Its polished black caught the afternoon light, casting a glow on the wall next to him. He pivoted on the dirt floor, allowing the sun to fall gently across his face, the warmth trickling in from between the warping of two great vertical beams which held the barn’s patched roof aloft. He smiled, closing his eyes, and his wrist snapped like the head of a snake. The point of his father’s blade dug into the barn’s cedar post across from him.

 

From somewhere behind him, hidden among the piled bales of hay and rusted fencing equipment which had long been neglected, Silas and Ana whooped and cheered, breaking the silence of the moment. Ezra smiled softly once more, forcing himself not to look back and show it to the children. He loved them greatly, how Ana excelled with her tracking and how young Silas could identify every animal in the surrounding forest. And mostly, how each beamed at him, wanting to grow up just as he. He was proud of them, though silently, just as he thought his father had been to him.

 

With casual pace, he stood, dusted off the seat of his pants, and collected his knife before sitting back in his flattened spot of hay. The children came and huddled closer to him, their curiosity overtaking their shyness. Ezra’s blade flicked open, buzzed the air, and thudded with assured repetition time and time again, chiseling the cedar post further. He let Silas hold the blade as the sun stretched toward its climax.

 

On a day like that day, when the sun was high and the world was polite, Ma would send Ezra and Silas the twelve miles into town to collect medicine and supplies to last until the next kind day. When Ma sent the boys on these errands it was not uncommon for Ezra to stop well down the main road and past the old, rusted plow at a small tavern. He had no money to spend on a drink, but the bartender was gentle to Ezra and let him sit for free. He left Silas outside to kick stones in the creek and chase grasshoppers and crickets across the open meadow. Sometimes, when the music was to his taste and he could sneak a cup of wine, Ezra would stay until dark listening to the chorus of man in the small room while Silas played.

 

It was on one such occasion where the empty bottles piled on bar, and the men talked loud and louder because they were drunk and they were men. Ezra sat with his cup of wine in the back corner of the crowded room when Silas pushed his way through the throng of men toward him.

 

“I am almost a man,” Silas said. “I want to be like you and have my own knife.”

 

“A man? No, little one,” Ezra said. “You are but a puppy. A boy gets to be a man only when a man is needed. Ma says that she has known boys forty years old because there was no need for a man.” And he pushed him away, too forcefully for he had been drinking. The boy sprawled into the front of a great, hulking being, knocking his wine from his hand, its contents pooling on the floor. The silence that followed was broken only by the back of the man’s hand connecting with Silas’ cheek, which dropped the child to the floor. A stream of red ran from the boy’s left nostril as he lay motionless. From practice, and on slurred instinct, Ezra’s wrist flicked like it had so many times before. The world froze as the man turned and faced Ezra, crimson running from his neck, eyes wide to match Ezra’s own. Then he tipped forward, flipping a table with his limp weight, its contents falling and shattering on the ground with him.

 

The consequence lay before Ezra, staining the scuffed floor. He hardly heard the shouts as he dragged Silas out the back door. They ran to his horse, leading it from under the trees. He threw on the saddle and cinched it tight for the steep trail home, caught the unwilling head and forced the bit into the mouth. The moon was just slipping behind the western ridge, leaving the valley in darkness behind it as the man and the boy ran away.

 

The moon was falling when Ezra rode on a winded horse to his home, young Silas on the saddle in front of him. His dog bounced out and circled the horse, yipping with pleasure as Ezra slid the saddle to the ground. The weathered little shack was silver in the moonlight, and the square shadow of it was black to the north and east. Against the east, the piling mountains were misty with light, their tops melted into the sky.

 

The front door of the cabin opened softly with a creak, and Ma called out into the dark, “Ezra? Is that you?” He was silent as she lit the lamp on her bedside. The crimson had bled into his denim and reflected black in the dim light. She did not speak to him as she woke Ana and told her and Silas to pack water, food, and blankets. She saw Ezra was changed. The fragile quality seemed to have gone from his chin. His lips, once full and softly curved, were now straight. However, it was in his eyes the greatest change had taken place. There was no laughter in them anymore, nor any apprehension. They were sharp and bright and purposeful. Ezra stood still in the corner of the room, watching, the early morning air blowing in from the open door.

 

And when the children asked to Ma, “Will Ezra come with us?” she said, “No. Ezra is a man now.” She darted like a bird about the room, kicking loose the floorboard and collected their father’s rifle, swiping off a thin layer of dust accumulated from being underfoot for so long, for there had been no need for its use. She pulled back the hammer, opened the breach block, and loaded a round before closing and pressing it gently into Ezra’s hands. He held it loosely in the crook of his elbow. Ma brought a little canvas bag and counted the loose cartridges into his hand. “Only seven left,” she warned. “Don’t be wasteful.” The spare rounds clattered to the floor as they slipped through his quivering fingers. 

 

Ezra turned to her. He seemed to look for a little softness, a little weakness in her. His eyes searched, but Ma’s face remained fierce. “Go now,” she said. “Do not wait to be caught.” Ma kissed his cheek, placed his father’s felt hat on his head, tied his handkerchief, and led the children out behind the cabin. The morning was being thinned by dawn now, and the big, yellow moon came down to meet the mountains. They would hide well in the undergrowth past the barn. The men would not search for them. Ezra sniffled once, then twice. They would not be long now.

 

When the grey shape of the barn had long melted into the top of the hillside and disappeared, Ma slumped to the ground. She started the mournful, high-pitched wail of sorrow, “My boy,” she cried, “our beautiful boy is gone.” The children wailed beside her, echoing her cries three times before Ma went silent and walked off on her own.

 

Silas and Ana stood wondering in the dawn and went to sit on the ledge above a shallow creek from which they’d fished a hundred times over. “When did Ezra become a man?” Ana asked.

 

“Last night,” said Silas. “Last night at the tavern.” The valley clouds turned red with the sun that still hid behind the mountains.

 

“What does it mean?” Ana asked.

 

Silas looked around at her. He drew his knowledge from the quiet air. “It means he has gone on a journey. He will never come back.”

 

“Is he dead? Do you think he is dead?”

 

Silas looked back in the direction of their home again. A little whisp of chimney smoke sat on the edge of his view through the trees. “He is not dead,” he explained, picking a fleck of dried blood from his nostril. “Not yet.”

 

The baying of dogs echoed in the distance as Ezra flung himself frantically behind a bush. He crawled up the hill toward the top of the cliff on his knees, slowly, cradling the rifle in his right hand. With the caution of prey, he inched closer toward the granite outcrop perched above the homestead. He could hear the horses' hooves rhythmically beating the ground down the trail leading to the cabin below.

 

His breath came heavy as he moved along the big rock until he came to a narrow slit that offered a thin alley of vision down to the trail below. Ezra lay on his stomach and pushed the rifle barrel through and waited. The weight of his mistake bore down upon him, each passing moment an agonizing reminder of his own misstep. Regret, a heavy shroud, enveloped him in its heavy embrace.

 

Movement drew Ezra’s attention far below, and he tightened his grip on the gun. For a long time, he waited. His hands shook heavily, and his body tensed with each passing moment. Despite the cool of the early morning, beads of sweat bubbled on his brow and dripped into his eyes. He wiped them away, muttering under his breath, his hands shaking further as he closed his left eye and shouldered the rifle, the front sight nestled in the v of the rear sight.

Ezra’s world echoed with the ticking of a clock inside his own head, each beat a hollow thud counting down the moments until his fate. He was to be a ghost, nothing but another man like his father who simply disappeared. He could taste the bitter tang of consequence in the air.

 

The movement came again, and he steadied his aim. Ezra closed his eye and squeezed the trigger. An explosion echoed down the hill, reverberating up the opposing mountain. The world fell still. Softly, he opened them once again, a plume of smoke blocking his view of the men. And then a flash of white sliced into the granite slit and a bullet whined away with a crash from below. Pain surged through Ezra’s left hand, blood spurting from where his index finger once was. The wounds bled evenly and aggressively as he fell away from the slit wailing in pain.

 

The barking and howling of dogs drew closer as Ezra pulled himself further up the hill toward its apex on the edge of the cliff. He crawled on, the pain in his hand ran through his wrist and settled as a throbbing ache inside his armpit. He continued slowly and methodically to the top of the big rock on the ridge. More crashes followed, disturbing sharp pieces of stone which cut into Ezra’s legs and torso. He dropped the rifle as a bullet pinged off its barrel just inches from his head.

 

The crashes did not stop once he reached the big rock. He bowed his head, trying to form familiar words, yet only a thick hiss emerged from his lips. Down below he could see the men and their dogs. There was no escape for him. The minutes stretched into an eternity. Each breath he took more precious than the last, each heartbeat a whispered reminder.

 

Yet, peculiarly, amidst the turmoil of his frantic thoughts, a calm settled within him. In this solitary moment, he didn’t plead. For even in the shadow of death, he sought only a fleeting glimpse of peace. Maybe he’d go differently. No, not on his own terms, but certainly in defiance of what was. Ezra removed his hat and handkerchief, placing them on the ground beside him. He braced his feet, swaying slightly, and standing erect, black against the morning sky. 

 

There came a ripping sound at his feet. A piece of stone flew up and a bullet droned off into the mountains behind. The hollow crash echoed all around. Ezra dropped to his knees, then, with a shaky breath, pulled himself straight again. 

 

The sky was just waking up, streaks of heat reaching out from behind the great peaks. The mountains stood sentry to their little farm below, dressed in evergreens right up to their crowns. It would be a kind day, but the children would be hungry. Ma would not want to cook breakfast.

 

His body jerked back. His right hand fluttered helplessly toward his breast as the second crash sounded around him. Ezra swung backward and toppled from the rock.